


In A Clearing

by jujubiest



Category: The Originals (TV)
Genre: Gen, Post-Finale, Post-Finale Spoilers, Wishful Thinking, deaths mentioned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-09
Updated: 2018-12-09
Packaged: 2019-09-14 21:25:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 686
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16920669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jujubiest/pseuds/jujubiest
Summary: Klaus expected oblivion. Or perhaps eternal torment was in order; if anyone had earned it, he certainly had. He was not expecting...this.





	In A Clearing

Klaus opens his eyes to a cloudless blue sky. It's quiet. Not silent, but...peaceful. There are birds. A breeze moving through leaves. Someone is leaning over him, a man. His familiar face is full of concern.

It's his father. Not Mikael, god no. His true father. A man he knew very briefly, but who was only ever kind to him.

A man he killed.

He scrambles his way into a sitting position, tries to move away. His father grasps his arm, pulls him to his feet and into an embrace.

Klaus just stands there, frozen. He doesn't understand. This man should hate him for what he did. He should be calling him a monster, calling for his blood--

He realizes he's been stammering all this aloud when his father's soft voice interrupts him.

"You're my son," he says, like that explains everything. Like that's  _enough_. "I could never hate you, no matter what you do."

Klaus returns the embrace then, tears silently falling to soak into the fabric of his father's shirt. He feels five years old in that moment, but in a way he never experienced in life: the safety of being very small and knowing that while the world may be harsh and confusing and cruel Out There, none of it can reach you within the sheltering arms of a loving parent.

When he pulls back, his father looks into his face for a long time, and Klaus almost lets himself believe he sees a glint of pride in those faded blue eyes.

"Come on now," he says at last, gripping Klaus's shoulder warmly and steering him down a sun-spattered path through the trees. "Everybody's waiting."

"Everybody?" Klaus asks, bemused. It's the first time he ever remembers feeling uncertainty without the accompanying fear.

"That brother of yours has been tearing up the woods to find you. Some kids I think you knew from back when, too, though I suspect some of them will be surprised to see you. I believe one of 'em said 'I will believe that when I see it." And plenty of family you never got to meet, too."

They step from the dappled shade of the path into a clearing drenched in golden light. There are familiar faces gathered around, sitting in clusters, talking and laughing. Klaus's eyes light on Stefan first. He's whispering something to a pretty young woman with long, light brown hair. He catches Klaus looking at him, and smiles. He looks lighter, more carefree, than Klaus ever knew him in life.

There are other familiar faces, too. Marcellus's little protege, with his boyfriend. Tyler. Klaus feels a momentary twinge of sadness that surprises him: Tyler, he had hoped, would live out his life free of Mikaelsons and their machinations. He had been so very young.

Then he notices who Tyler is talking to: a happy couple, dark heads bent together in casual intimacy. Their faces so transformed by happiness that at first, Klaus barely knows them.

Jackson, and...Hayley.

She's smiling. She looks so _alive._ But the memory of her death is still fresh. He lifts an absentminded hand to wipe away traitorous tear.

Klaus notices, distantly, that there's no daylight ring on his finger. He tips his face up to the warm light, eyes sliding closed and a tentative smile on his lips. This place, it feels...it feels like peace. 

"Oh, and that girl you like so much is around here somewhere." Klaus looks at his father questioningly, thinking with a pang _please don't let it be Caroline._ Much as he would love to see her, he fervently hopes her time is nowhere near its end.

"Pretty thing," his father chuckles, clearing up Klaus's questions not at all. "Stubborn as hell. Sharp as a tack. Prone to psychoanalyzing us all."

Klaus opens his eyes and turns to ask a question, but a movement at the far edge of the clearing catches his eye. Sunlight caught in golden hair. A smile he thought he would never see again.

The question dies before it reaches his lips, is reborn as a single, whispered answer:

"Camille."


End file.
